Top Tier AdmissionsMaria Laskaris joins Top Tier Admissions as one of the most experienced admissions deans in the country. She graduated from Dartmouth College in 1984, and served as Director of Admissions at Dartmouth for over a decade where she evaluated tens of thousands of applicants. From 2007-2015 she served as the Dean of Admissions and Financial Aid at Dartmouth, overseeing all facets of the admissions and financial aid processes. She played an integral role in developing key enhancements to the Common Application, serving on the 14-member Board of Directors. With over 25 years of admissions experience at one of the most selective colleges in the country, she provides an insider’s perspective like no other, with deep knowledge of selective college admissions.
In addition, Maria is proud of her long-term volunteer work with Opera North (Lebanon, NH) in fundraising, marketing and audience engagement. She is an avid masters rower with the Upper Valley Rowing Foundation (Hanover, NH) and also serves as a member of its board of directors.
March came in like a lion and never let up—a whirlwind of buzzer-beaters, acceptance letters, and policy shifts. As college hopefuls anxiously refreshed portals for admissions decisions, the NCAA’s March Madness delivered its annual excitement, with underdog upsets and last-second heroics making headlines. But the activity wasn’t confined to the court or college campuses. The […]
The early admissions season, which stretches from mid-October to mid-February and includes two rounds of binding Early Decision and one round of non-binding Early Action, is shaping up to be one for the record books. Although more top private universities are choosing the path of less transparency regarding their EA or ED application results, we’ve […]
Over the last several months, a range of stories from The Free Press to The Wall Street Journal have proclaimed that students are ditching the Ivies for universities in the South. Setting aside the hyperbolic headlines, why are some Southern universities seeing surges in application volume? Economic factors — the cost of education and career […]
This application season, we’re watching to see how a few things will play out: the reintroduction of the SAT/ACT requirement at several top schools, the drop in enrollments of Black and Latino students, the California ban on legacy admissions, and the predicted “enrollment cliff.” All four will have interesting implications for this application cycle and […]
This year’s high school seniors navigated an admissions season bookended by the Supreme Court’s decision to overturn affirmative action and a fiasco with the federal financial aid form (FAFSA) that has left half a million students and their families without vital information on college costs and financial aid awards. In between, we saw campuses beset […]
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